Updates

Just before I crash back into bed, I feel bad that I haven't been letting anyone know what's up with me and my family.

Bryan is in school. He's going back for another degree in accounting. Since he already has so many classes under his belt, it was something that he could get in a year and that he liked. Bad news was that since he has a degree, there are zero funding options available, so we had to pay for it ourselves, up front. Ouch. But obviously we feel like this is the right thing and will be worth the investment of time, money, and family effort.

Living. We are, thankfully. We're staying at my mother's parent's house on the far west side of town. It was a little crowded over the summer when my mom, my two brothers, me and my 3 boys, our dog, and my grandparents were all in the house. It was chaotic, but pretty fun. Having a lot of people around is pretty neat, I think. But my mom and her boys now have their own house - one house over - and we're settling in for the short haul over here until Bryan gets a job.

I have a job now. I applied at Michaels, where I've worked before, and was hired back. I always loved working there, and I still do. The people are nice, the customers are fairly nice, it's a pretty easy and enjoyable job. But! I work nights right now, and it's killing me. I get almost no sleep, and so I spend most of my days and days off sleeping. It's been really rough. And I REALLY miss being at home with my boys. It's NOT a break to go to work. Although I can say with certainty now that working is easier than parenting by a bajillion miles. My first day was a real doozy, and all my coworkers were asking "So, how are you doing?" And I replied very honestly that it was much easier than my other job -- Mom.

Alexander is an interesting child, shall we say. He's so opposite everything that Christopher was. He eats EVERYTHING he can find, but he's also a crawler and scoots amazingly fast all over the house. Keeping the floors clean enough to prevent him from eating/chewing at least one really bad thing a day seems to be impossible, and I have pulled several nasty things away from him while he was on floors I'd just cleaned, including a trip to the ER after he ate BOTH a piece of glass and a pill not five minutes after I'd scoured the floor he was on and I could have sworn it was perfect. He must have a radar for those things, either that or I'm blind. Other that than terrible habit, his only other bad habits are that he doesn't sleep for more than 2 hours, ever. Night or day. He eats constantly, leading me to surrender my plan to fully breastfeed for most of a year, and give in to giving him bottles and baby food. I still mostly nurse, but he'll just keep eating and eating. He loves those puffed crunchy things they sell for babies (something like flavored, mushy rice crispies with a fancy package and a high price tag), because he can eat them I suspect. He loves eating anything you let him put in his mouth. And he HAS teeth, they've been there for over a month, but they just aren't coming through. You can see them, they just don't wanna come out. Poor baby. And he crawls, stands up on everything he can, babbles, laughs at everything, and generally is very adorable. I love him a lot, bad habits notwithstanding. I'm very glad he came to join us.

Christopher LOVES his brother. He's very helpful, and surprisingly trustworthy around him. He's not mean to his brother, and he's careful to make sure that his brother has safe things, and he keeps his own little toys (legos, etc) locked safely in his room on a closet shelf. I've been so impressed with Christopher and how responsible he is. And I never even asked him to really. He's LOVING living near his uncles and his "DeeDee" - my mom. Living at Grandma's is fun too, like a permanent sleepover at party central! He loves the big backyard, all the people around him, the fact that there's a TV here with kid's channels, how much room there is to play, all the toys.... it's great for him and he's having a blast. The only thing I'm sad about is that Christopher is a very schedule-oriented kid, he always wants to know what's happening when, and this place is pretty chaotic, so he doesn't have that and sometimes it's tough on him. But otherwise, he's having a blast. He's growing up so fast. He likes to do "school" with me, and I'm happy to see that he's getting a little better with his letters. He's great with numbers, he loves to count and he can add and subtract in his head with basic numbers. He really surprises me sometimes with what he can do with numbers. But letters don't seem to interest him. But a little "school", some fun home-made flash cards, and time with Mommy seem to be working past that aversion, and he's getting better with letters, although I don't know that he'll ever love them like he does numbers.

So, I waxed a little long-winded about the boys, but I'm a mommy who loves them very much, and I know that most people want to hear about them anyway, so I don't worry about it! I hope this little update helps everyone "catch up" with us just a bit. It's been so crazy (and exhausting!) that I haven't done anything with anyone for so long and I miss everyone. I hope you are all well.